


You Know You'll Sink But You Still Jump In

by imawalkingtravesty



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Author Is Sleep Deprived, Bittersweet Ending, Bruce Banner & Tony Stark Friendship, Bruce Banner Is a Good Bro, Clint Barton Is a Good Bro, Depressed Tony Stark, Gen, Happy Hogan is a Good Bro, Hurt Tony Stark, I hate marvel, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Minor Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Oblivious Steve Rogers, Post-Avengers (2012), Pre-Iron Man 3, Protective Pepper Potts, Protective Steve Rogers, Sad Tony Stark, Steve Rogers is a dick, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, The Avengers Are Good Bros, Tony Stark Angst, Tony Stark Does What He Wants, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Is Not Helping, Tony Stark Is a Good Bro, Tony Stark Needs Sleep, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony Stark-centric, he's trying his best, suicidal Tony stark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-23
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-26 22:31:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20749829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imawalkingtravesty/pseuds/imawalkingtravesty
Summary: Maybe he just wanted to hear ‘you’re suicidal, Tony’, and maybe he was ready to finally admit it.In which Tony Stark is a reckless idiot and the team can't seem to see through the mistakes.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is not a happy fic, it does not have a happy ending, there's some comfort, but not really, have fun.  
:)

“Tony. On your left.”

Tony turned, spotting a robot lunging at him, and he quickly shot him down. “Thanks Cap.”

“Just be more attentive next time.”

Captain America did not take thanks well. Where’s Tony’s ‘you’re welcome?’ It’s hard enough getting him to say thank you, at least make it worth the while.

They’ve been fighting for a while now, and everyone was very on edge. Clint had been benched, a blow to his shoulder that left him unable to draw any arrows, and was now reduced to being the eyes up above, perched on a tall building. But Tony admitted that he felt uneasy leaving him up there; he was unable to defend himself, and he was alone. Clint quickly made everyone go from feeling worried and sorry for him to being annoyed with his complaints about not being able to fight. 

“Thor, you’ve got several bots underneath you,” Clint said. “If I could shoot, they’d be gone by now.”

“We get it, Clint,” Tony said through gritted teeth, watching Thor slam into every single bot with his hammer, managing just fine.

“Well, I don’t see you reduced to-“

“Clint, Tony, enough,” Nat shut them both up. 

“Let him hear it, he needs it!” Tony protested, blasting a few bots away from him. 

“Stark, just stop talking,” Natasha said, and her exhaustion rang clear even through the comms. 

Tony pulled a face even though nobody could see through the suit. He wanted this battle to be over, there had already been a few casualties, and he just wanted to go home and take a nap. They’d been facing a losing streak lately, with civilians getting killed in the midst of the battle, and he wasn’t looking forward to looking at the death toll for this one.

He quickly scanned around. There weren’t too many dog-looking bots left. They’d already neutralized the dummy who started it all (adding a casualty, although not an innocent one), so all they had to do now was neutralize the many robots that remained. It wasn’t even that they did much damage; it was just that they were very sturdy, hard to kill, and could potentially harm unprotected civilians (read; people not in Iron Man suits).

“Stark! Building at three o’clock!” Steve yelled into the comm. Tony looked at his right, and his heart plunged.

What he also noticed, was the bot running straight to him, and the blast from one of the specially equipped robots with guns heading for him. If he blasted the robot coming from him, the blast would hit him and electrocute him, if he dodged the blast, the robot would get him, and if he got to the person trapped in the building that currently had robots scaling to walls to get to the person, well, more than one robot would get him.

“Odds of me surviving?” he asked his suit, doing his best to try and figure out a way to dodge both at once, and percentages of survival immediately popped up. 68% for being attacked by robo-dog, 53% for the laser blast, and 17% for getting the civilian. All of that only took a second.

Tony smiled. Be the hero, and take a break. Perhaps from life, but it was still a break. And heck, he’d save the civilian or die trying.

“Sir?” JARVIS asked, confused as to why, even after calculates the odds of survival, he was flying toward the person calling for help out of the twelfth floor. “Might I ask what your intentions are?”

“Save the guy or die trying,” he responded.

Truth be told, he didn’t know why the thought had suddenly popped into his head. It wasn’t like he didn’t think about dying on a regular basis, but during battle, he usually enjoyed living. He had purpose while he was fighting. But for some reason, there was a voice telling him that now was his chance to finally rest a hero. The dead only get praised. The dead get glorified, Howard had proved that.

They call them intrusive thoughts for a reason. 

Tony soared through and grabbed the person, who turned out to actually be a ten-year-old boy so thank god he did, but a couple of bots grabbed onto his boots and were intent on hurting him. He tried to kick them off, but couldn’t try anything dicey with the boy in his arms.

“I got him!” Thor yelled, and Tony looked quickly to the side as the boy got wrenched from his arms at a break-neck speed. He sighed in relief when he noticed that the kid had managed to hold onto Thor, and through his struggle with the bots gaining on him, he spotted him being put down a safe distance away from the battle beside a couple people staying to watch, the idiots.

“Stark!” he heard through the comms and he turned his head to look in the direction of Captain America, but he realized what Cap was referring to too late. A blast hit him right in the arc reactor, disabling the power and for a horrible second, the thing that kept him alive. He felt himself falling, and his chest hurt, and he hit the ground quickly and there were robots obstructing his vision, and he couldn’t get the suit rebooted, and they were ripping apart at the metal, and and andandand-

Tony woke up, bloody and sore.

“Hey, he’s awake,” a disembodied voice said, and when Tony blinked quickly and focused, he realized that it was Clint’s face hovering above him. “We won, man, all them bots, crushed.”

Tony didn’t say anything, scrunching his eyes shut. Everything was so blurry and it smelled like antiseptic. He opened them again and took in the details one at a time. He was in SHIELD medical. The rest of the team was surrounding his bed. Clint’s arm was in a sling. His head hurt. Heck, all of his muscles hurt. 

“You’re a hero, Stark,” Clint continued, showing him an article on his phone. “You saved a ten-year-old’s life. Along with the rest of the world, but he’s a child, so it’s different.”

“Yup. The news tends to do that,” Tony groaned, bringing his hands up to rub at his eyes, but they felt like lead so he just let them fall on his stomach.

“He’s not supposed to be looking at a screen, concussion and all that,” Bruce said, pulling Clint’s phone away from Tony. “I think he should rest as well. There’s a lot of us here.”

“Yeah. Let the hero sleep,” Tony smirked. “While you’re at it, the lights?”

“We’ll kill them. Good job today, Stark,” Captain America said, clapping him on the shoulder, and Tony was so weirded out by the sentence that he forgot to wince when his hand hit a sore muscle.

Good job today, Stark?

If sacrificing himself meant so much to the others, maybe he should do it more often.

\--

As soon as he got back to the tower and off of the pain medicine, he just stayed in bed.

He was afraid.

He was afraid of his own thoughts. He couldn’t believe what he had thought, he couldn’t believe the little voice that told him that it was okay to just let go, play the hero, and finally rest. It was his own thoughts that told him that if he did that, if he sacrificed himself, he would finally be able to take a break. He had seen too much, and living was proving to get more difficult by the hour, so to finally rid himself of feeling and get to rest, it seemed like a great answer at the time. But at the time he was tired, right? He was tired and in pain, and there were others in danger. He wasn’t thinking straight.

That wasn’t who he was. Tony Stark was perfectly sane, thank you very much.

Pepper went to go check on him, and he said that his head still hurt and that he was resting; and if she was skeptical because Tony wanted to actually rest for once, she didn’t say anything. She came up an hour later with a sandwich and some tea, but he told her that he wanted to sleep for a bit, so she left. He didn’t sleep. He couldn’t sleep, he couldn’t live with his mind at the moment. His own mind scared him, that was a first.

Usually his mind was his safe place. He could design things in his mind, and file them away for later when he could get his hands on some tools. He had a fantastic and brilliant mind, heck, that was one of the things that people actually complimented him on. Tony Stark was a genius. That much was obvious.

So why was his mind such a weird place today?

And why couldn’t he wait for the next battle?

\--

Literally the day after Tony was given the ‘okay’ to go back to avenging, the world’s latest idiot decided to test her inventions in New York. Flying, large, metallic bees swarmed the buildings, falling at random times and crushing small buildings and unfortunately, people. They didn’t look quite as dangerous as they could’ve been, not being able to actually shoot things, so only Tony, Clint and Steve were called in. Nat and Bruce stayed at the tower, Nat preparing for a top-secret mission that none of Tony’s prying could get her to spill on, and Bruce preferring researching over turning into a giant rage monster and potentially crushing half of Manhattan. 

The creator was begging them not to hurt the stupid metallic bees, screaming that it was for the sake of science, and who could blame her? Tony understood, and heck, it was a miracle that the bees got off the ground at all; because according to all known laws of aviation, there is no way a bee should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat little body off the ground. 

Tony just had to think. He could get the bees out of the air, not harm any of them or any other people. He just needed time. Thankfully, the bots were slow and lazy, unlike actual bees, and sort of just flew around aimlessly until they sensed something in front of them and turned the other way. Like spruce bugs, large and intimidating, but not really all that smart.

Spruce bugs.

Bugs.

“I have an idea. Make sure everyone gets evacuated,” Tony said, changing his course, heading straight for his tower. 

“What are you doing?” Clint asked. “We need your help!”

“I told you, I have an idea. I’ll be back in a few,” Tony instructed through the comms, already landing on the penthouse balcony.

The suit dematerialized around him, and he quickly headed to his workshop. He could do this quickly, just needed to stop the signal, and they should drop like flies. It wouldn’t be too hard, he just needed to figure out what frequency they all ran on, and interrupt it. A few, close-flying bees could be salvageable, and if the women had half a brain (debatable), then she would’ve kept the blue prints. Heck, he’d look into hiring her if she didn’t decide to test them in one of the busiest cities for god’s fucking sake, putting people’s lives in danger.

“JARVIS? Connect comms,” Tony said, throwing old pieces of metal around. He needed a specific piece. “And hack into the computers of crazy girl, we need the blue prints.”

“Done, sir,” JARVIS answered. “The blue prints are on the screen.”

Tony smirked at the girl’s terrible security. JARVIS didn’t even need his help.

“Barton, how’s the evacuation going?” he asked, scanning the lab for an Arduino Mega. He hadn’t needed one of those in a while, since everything was coded into the system. He just had to ask and it would happen, no need to lift a finger.

“Almost everyone gone. But hurry, the bees are discovering that they can fit between buildings now,” came Clint’s tense voice. “The girl’s gone frantic. We need you out here.” 

“I just gotta make a remote,” Tony said, finally finding a circuit board. “Won’t take long.”

He returned to work, twisting copper wires and clipping things together into a mess. In the end, it was cardboard with a mess of wires coming out of it, but it worked. It only had two buttons; and on button, and an off button, totally designed for single use only. Once the interrupter was pressed, it would stay down forever, blocking the signal. But it would work.

“Ready,” Tony said, the suit enclosing around him. He picked up the remote. For it to work, he’d have to be in the middle of everything. The signal would reach only as far as one kilometer in every direction, but as he flew, he realized that the bees hadn’t moved much. 

“Do your thing, Stark,” Steve Rogers said. “Everyone’s evacuated.”

Tony landed with a clunk on the ground in what he estimated was the middle of all of the bees, and the crazy bee lady ran toward him. 

“Please don’t hurt them, they’re not trying to hurt people, it’s for science! And-”

“Ma’am, please, you’re going to get hit,” Tony said, pointing above her at the bees circling above. “Either take shelter, or run.”

“Sir, please; I’ve spent years developing these! Imagine what we can do with this technology, its-”

“You have five seconds to run,” he cut her off. “Your creations are going to crush you.”

“But we could economize planes, make them less polluting, there’s so many-”

“Five, four,” Tony started. “Three-”

“Sir, you of all people! You’re a man of the future!”

“Two!”

“Why are you doing this to me!” she yelled, full of pain, but she ran away all the same, staring tearfully at the sky, taking in one last glimpse of the inventions. A few would be salvageable. She still has the blue prints. Tony closed his eyes and tried to convince himself that she would be okay.

“One,” he whispered, pushing the button. The effect was immediate, all of the bees tumbling down, crashing into pavement and trees alike.

He chanced a glance at the lady, and saw that she was running, not looking up any more, and there was a giant ball of metal falling right in her path. If she didn’t stop, she’d get crushed. Tony weighed his options, knowing that he could very well just sweep in and grab her, but something about flying into the giant bee called him. And he couldn’t get it to shut up.

“Odds!” Tony shouted, and the little numbers showed up in his vision. 79% chance of survival for sweeping the lady out of the way. 34% for crashing into the bee.

He didn’t think twice. He fired the flight repulsors and launched himself toward the machinery, and crashed into it head-on. The impact jarred his armour, the scraps of metal going in between the joints, and the motor conked out. He couldn’t get it started in time, as he was confused and his reaction time was slowed, so Tony hit the ground hard, his body rattling inside the armour.

“Stark?” Clint’s tentative voice asked.

Tony couldn’t answer. He felt like every bone in his body had just been wrenched out of their sockets. 

“Stark!” Clint repeated.

“Barton, keep the people out of the way. Nobody needs to see this,” Cap said, and the metal was wrenched off of Tony. He was lying face down on the pavement, and squinted at the light even though his helmet filtered a lot visual input. Bright. Ow. Head.

Careful hands rolled Tony over, and he found himself staring up at the sky. Blue sky. Clear day, warm too, and he smiled, as if he had just noticed the weather. Nice day to go out strolling, maybe he’ll go out in the park after this, have a picnic with Pepper, take a walk, breathe in the air. After he got the armour off. If it could still be taken off, that is; it was heavily dented.

The helmet got ripped off, and he glanced at Cap with unfocused eyes. But there were two Captain Americas! That meant double the lecturing, because Tony did something stupid, and will he hear it later. Cap knew how to pack a mean punch, and knew the exact words that could hit Tony where it hurts; he was as skilled with his words as he was with his hands. Quite large and strong hands, considering he could rip off a face plate that was supposed to withstand anything. Tony really needed to work on that. And he needed to remind Steve that there was a latch on the back of his neck that released the helmet.

“You coherent, Stark?” Steve held a hand above Tony’s mouth, testing if he was breathing. Tony let out a huff of air.

“Pain n’ the,” Tony trailed off, meaning to saw that it was a pain in the ass to fix the armour when it was broken like that, but he forgot how to say the rest of the sentence. It also helped that ow, his jaw hurt. And ow, his head hurt. 

“Yeah. You’re hurt,” Steve looped an arm around Tony’s armour in an attempt to haul him up, and that made everything hurt more.

“You mad?” he asked, not fighting Steve’s grip. 

“You’ll hear it later,” came the short reply. Tony curled his lip.

“Rogers, I-” Tony started, once he was fully up. The world was swaying, and bile rose in the back of his throat, and his head was so heavy. He swallowed hard, knowing what was coming as the pain in his head reached a peak.

“Yes?” Steve asked, raising an eyebrow expectantly.

“I,” Tony said. “I-” 

He cut himself off by keeling over and vomiting. Steve expertly pulled him aside before he could fall over into a puddle of his own mess, and looped his arm under the shoulders of the Iron Man armour. “I think you should sit down.”

But Tony didn’t answer. His eyes closed as his legs gave away, and the whole world tilted forward.

\--

“Now is it time for angry Cap?” 

Steve sighed. “You know what you did wrong.”

Tony huffed, straightening up in the hard chair he was sitting in. He was less loopy now, but definitely still concussed. SHIELD medical had swooped in and helped while he was still really out of it, but now that he was actually consciously aware that something was going on, he was expected to attend the press conference that usually followed. A statement about the battle, then they could all get cleaned up.

“You flew into a giant metal bee when you could’ve easily saved bee lady without harm,” Steve said exasperatingly. “I don’t know why you want me to get mad at you so much!”

Tony stayed silent. He too, didn’t know why he wanted someone to yell at him. To punch. To kick. And he was starting to get frustrated, usually after he was injured while being reckless Cap would be all over him, saying that he was suicidal and going to get himself killed one day. And Tony always said that no, he wasn’t actively trying to die, that he just wasn’t thinking about his life and just wanted to save the others. Then Steve would walk out with his hands up in surrender, not knowing how to talk to Tony, and the matter would be dropped. 

But for some reason, Tony was itching for Steve to say that he did something wrong. To yell at him that he was going to get himself killed, and how he’s going to get him re-evaluated to see if he was actually mentally fit to be in battle. Maybe Tony really wanted to see someone lay out all of his problems in front of him, threaten to get him fixed, but never actually arrange for a psych evaluation. 

Maybe he just wanted to hear ‘you’re suicidal, Tony’, and maybe he was ready to finally admit it.

The press conference happened without incident, and without any questions allowed, it wrapped up pretty quickly. Steve kept close by in case Tony were to keel over again (he was looking pretty pale and kept complaining in whispers about how his head hurt), and supplied a gentle hand on his back when Tony stood up shakily. 

Back at the tower, while Tony sat on the couch on bed rest, Steve brought him a cup of chamomile tea to calm him. Tony thanked him quietly, wincing when the small amount of noise spent spikes slamming into his brain. It all just hurt.

“You alright?” Steve asked, his brow furrowed. “You look sick.”

“Not feeling too hot,” Tony said softly, pointing to his head. “Got hit pretty hard.”

“No shit,” Clint said, returning to the common room after a shower and getting changed. “I saw you go down, looked bad. Not only that, Cap’s not screaming his head off at ya, that’s like, a whole new level of sympathy.”

“Barton,” Steve raised an eyebrow at Clint, his ‘captain’ composure returning. 

“Usually by now you’re calling SHIELD for a psych eval, just saying,” Clint put his hands up in surrender.

Steve didn’t say anything, just dropped two pills onto the coffee table beside the mug of tea. “Advil.”

“Thank fuck,” Tony sighed, grabbing the pills and swallowing them dry. “Dunno how much they’ll help, but damn, do I need them.”

“You addicted to ibuprofen or something?”

“Shut up Barton. Let the hero rest,” Tony retorted. “Saved her, didn’t I?”

“Wasn’t a ten-year-old boy. Things are different when it’s a grown adult,” Clint smirked. “You’re no longer a hero, you’re just an Avenger,” he pointed at the muted TV that was playing footage from the fight. The headline ‘Avengers Save New York From Giant Bees’ read underneath, and just the light from the TV made Tony cringe. 

“Same difference,” he said, massaging his temples. “I think I need to lie down.”

“We’ll leave you be,” Steve said, glaring at Clint. “Right, Barton?”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t kill yourself too soon, man,” Clint placed his hand on Tony’s shoulder, squeezed it, then left with Cap.

Tony waved his hand at the TV screen, turning it off. He curled up on the couch, relishing the silence, but it didn’t last long; the voices in his head were screaming at him, asking why he didn’t die, asking why he put himself in danger, and every thought had a different opinion. He knew they wouldn’t quiet down soon, but the amount of thinking just made him dizzy, and he wished everything would just shut up.

God, did his head hurt.

\--

Time slowed down when he worked in the workshop.

There were things to do, and there wasn’t a clock anywhere, so time went by without being time. It was like Schrödinger’s cat; if he didn’t know what time it was, then the hour was simply all of the hours. Just like how the cat is both dead and alive, and if he didn’t know where someone was, that meant that they were everywhere at once. Schrödinger was a weird fellow.

It wasn’t all that bad, too be honest. He could go without sleeping.

Or eating.

Or anything at all, really.

But lately, Tony was a mess. He’d been working on the same thing for the past few days, but he messed up the circuitry, which messed up the wiring, which messed up everything, so when he booted up the machine it just sputtered and died. He was working on dismantling and rewiring it all now, but with a slightly heavier heart and with quiet frustration boiling behind his steady hands. 

He pulled on a wire, maybe a bit too hard, and maybe on purpose, and a spark flew into the air. A jolt of electricity sparked through Tony, just doing enough to make him flinch, but when he saw that the spark had ignited part of his project, he knew he had a bigger problem. Dum-E whirred quickly with a fire extinguisher in hand, and Tony frantically tried to pat down the flames, but it was too late. 

An explosion shook the floor and threw Tony across the room, bits of metal going everywhere. He hit the wall hard, his ear drums ringing, and it took him a few seconds to realize that his chest felt like it was on fire. He looked down, and a singular piece of sharp metal had pierced the arc reactor, making it stutter along with his heart. He brought his hand up, ripping the fabric of his shirt and resting his hand on top of the metal sticking out.

“Sir, Dr Banner is on the floor above. Would you like me to notif-”

“No! JARVIS, no,” Tony said, shaking his head to clear the fog. “Don’t intervene. Just, just let me,” he trailed off, saving his breath. “Fuck. Dum-E? You alright?”

A whirring sounded from nearby, and Tony turned his head slightly to his right. Dum-E was stuck on his side, and was nearly drowning in fire extinguisher solution, but otherwise seemed okay. Great. He could work with that. 

“Nice try, bud,” he reached out his other hand, at least he meant to, but his arm stayed still on the ground beside him. “I-”

“Sir?”

Tony looked down at his arc reactor, which had fully gone out, his heart pumped faster, which was probably a problem considering the whole shrapnel thing, and his chest was heaving, and oh, god. This was how he died, right? Finally succumbing to the shrapnel, killing himself trying to fix an invention? Was this how he wanted to go? This wasn’t even a heroic death, this was just pathetic.

But no. Any way to go was a great way to go. At least, this way, nobody else would have to watch him fall, watch him take his last breaths, he just had to close his eyes and it would all be over. His eyelids felt so heavy anyway, and his head was spinning, would it help to cease visual input? What did he want his last dying words to be? Was he really, really dying? For sure this time?

He closed his eyes, and his hand fell away from his arc reactor, landing with a quiet thump on the ground beside him.

“Dr Banner is-” his AI started.

“Fuck, Tony!” 

Tony tried to open his eyes but he was too tired.

“JARVIS, does he have an extra, one of those things?” Bruce asked his AI. Tony silently wished he’d put him on mute. He just wanted to slip away.

“On the safe to your left, Dr Banner. 27-09-72.”

Tony heard a clambering and a dial spin, and then the squeak of the hinges. He tried to move his hand to protect his chest again, but it was like he was stuck in his own body.

“Hey, hey Tony,” Bruce said, slapping Tony’s cheek with the back of his hand. “You in there?”

He tried to open his eyes again, and they fluttered for second before his head drooped too far to the right and his neck gave away and he was in a very awkward position with his head on his shoulder and it made his neck cramp up, but he couldn’t move it because his head was just too damn heavy. Heck, everything was heavy. It was like a heavy large and heavy blanket fell on him, and weighed his limbs down. All his senses were dulled as well, Bruce’s calling sounding like he was underwater and the hands taking out his damaged arc reactor felt slow and sluggish. 

His arc reactor.

Tony, out of pure panic and adrenaline, lifted a hand up to grab onto Bruce’s wrist. He wrenched his eyes open, and blinked a few times to focus, finally resting on Bruce’s wide eyes.

“I’m not going to hurt you, alright? I’m putting a new one in,” Bruce said, the panic in his voice completely toned down. He did that sometimes, he would keep the panic at bay until the crisis was dealt with and then freak out. 

Tony’s body, because it seemed autonomous at this point, decided that it could trust Bruce and let go of his wrist, even though his brain was screaming at him that SOMEONE HAD HIS ARC REACTOR OH MY GOD-

There was a twist and a spike of pain that ran up to Tony’s jaw, and his entire body jerked as the arc reactor powered up the magnet and his heart basically restarted. His chest heaved with new breaths, gulping down air as the weighted blanket and head-fogginess feeling slowly went away, and he wiggled his fingers just to prove that he could. He sat up properly against the wall, a bit too quickly, because all of the vision that he newly acquired left and he nearly passed out again.

“Hey; easy,” Bruce said, putting a hand on his shoulder, holding him there. 

Tony lazily reached out a hand, palm open, facing the ceiling in a universal sign of ‘gimme’. Bruce placed the damaged arc reactor in his hand, and Tony brought it up to his eyes to look at it; the metal had pierced the casing around it, cutting through an important wire which cut the circulation. If the metal had been slightly to either side of the arc reactor, it would’ve pierced a vital organ and he would’ve died. 

He kind of wished he moved just slightly to the right; would’ve gotten him straight in the heart.

“What happened?” Bruce asked, reminding Tony that he was here.

“Boom,” he answered lazily, chucking the broken arc reactor into the heart of the wreckage. 

“I heard the explosion. I don’t know who didn’t; shook the entire building, I thought Thor came back or something but when I asked JARVIS he said you needed assistance,” Bruce said, clearing a bit of metal beside Tony so he could sit against the wall.

“Traitor,” Tony muttered, glaring at the ceiling.

“You were dying, sir,” the AI answered with the tone of a know-it-all. 

Tony just closed his eyes, taking a deep breath in, then out. He nearly died. Maybe that was the point, right? He knowingly pulled hard on that wire, knowing something bad would happen. Or did he? Was it really an honest mistake? Tony Stark never made mistakes, that was the whole thing; everything he did had a purpose, and as much as he really, really wanted to let his body accept that fact that it was a mistake, he knew deep down that it might not have been. 

“You alright?”

“I’m great,” he sighed, letting his head fall against Bruce’s shoulder. 

“You sure?” Bruce asked tentatively. 

“Peachy. I’m going to bed,” Tony shakily stood up, and blackness crept in from the side of his vision. He swayed for a bit until Bruce grabbed onto his shoulder to steady him, and slowly, his vision returned. 

“Hypotension. Rest and water,” Bruce diagnosed. “Go to bed.”

“That’s the plan. Could you right Dum-E? He’s having some trouble,” Tony pointed down at his robot, who was still lying sideways. “Clean this up, will you? Just toss the scraps in the scrap bin. And destroy the arc reactor,” he instructed. Bruce rightened the robot, and Dum-E gave two clicks before whirring off to go find whatever.

“Can you walk? Bruce asked, still not releasing Tony’s shoulder.

“Probably,” he answered, and he took a shaky step forward. And another. And another. Bruce released his grip, and they all made their way over to the entrance, Brucie right behind Tony in case he were to collapse again.

Bruce pressed the button to call the elevator. “You’ll be fine, right? No more explosions? No more almost-killing yourself?”

“No promises. And Bruce?” 

“Yeah?”

“Thanks for saving my life,” Tony lied through his teeth.

Bruce walked away feeling accomplished, and Tony walked away with a heavy heart.

Because that was how the world worked.


	2. Chapter 2

Fuck. 

Tony couldn’t, he couldn’t see, he couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t focus. He couldn’t.

His legs gave away and he used all of his upper body strength to hold him up against the counter, and once his legs were positioned under him properly, he brought out his best drink; scotch, bottled the same year that his parents died. Decades ago, and man, was it expensive. But it was fine. He originally planned to down it all on December 16th, but never got around to it, because it was hidden behind other bottles and dammit he wanted a drink, it didn’t matter what drink, he just needed it now.

But he was slightly more composed than the last December 16th, which still wasn’t saying much, and he could wait a tiny bit longer to pull out the bottle. He also got out a special whisky glass; tulip shaped, perfect for swirling around. Not that he’d actually wait long enough to be able to mix it, but it was fancy and went well with the whole idea of drinking until he physically could not anymore. 

Scotch was made for savouring. Scotch was made to be paired with things like ice and water and in cocktails to bring out all of the flavours, but Tony just poured it into the glass, and drank it quickly. He didn’t let it coat his tongue, he didn’t let the aftertaste envelop him like he usually did. He poured more, and then more, and then more, until he gave up on small, appropriate amounts of scotch and just poured until the liquid was an inch away from the rim of the glass and worked from there.

The mission went badly. They raided an abandoned hydra base, knowing that there would be people inside, but it all blew up. The people that claimed they weren’t Hydra, just some ‘gang’ using the base, were heavily armed with Chitauri technology that basically blew up the entire place. Clint was very injured, and stayed unconscious the entire flight back; he began vomiting blood just as they’d landed, and medical rushed in and hauled him away.

Steve called for a debrief in fifteen minutes. Tony looked at the time. That was half an hour ago.

He put his half-empty glass down and sat on the bar stool, his head resting against the table. He stared through the light caramel liquid and hugged himself. He knew he was a mess. He knew that Clint getting injured was his fault, Steve didn’t need to spend the entire debrief yelling at him for that. Nat would be there to goad on Cap. Bruce too. Same with Thor. Tons of people to cut through Tony with their words and taunts as if they didn’t know how much he was blaming himself already.

Just drink. Drink and forget. Don’t feel guilty about skipping the debrief. They don’t need you.

“What are the odds that I die from drinking?” Tony asked his AI, humouring himself.

“You are at 47% now, sir,” the AI answered. “Captain Rogers is becoming impatient with you. Should I let him know of your predicament?”

“No one knows. Protocol Who Do You Work For,” Tony answered, picking up his glass and downing it, the alcohol running down his throat, having been numbed with all of the previous drinking. “What about now?” he asked, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.”

“BAC at 0.30%. Risk of death at 53%. I recommend-”

“JARVIS, no. I don’t ask you for much-”

“You only ask me for things, sir.” JARVIS quipped.

Tony sighed, and just poured himself another full glass. He took careful sips, feeling his stomach might revolt on him, but soon finished the glass anyway. “What about now?”

“61%.”

“Learned your lesson, I see, JARVIS,” Tony slurred, rubbing his hand on his face. Why was he doing this again? Oh yeah. Barton. He must not be drunk enough if he could remember that, so he poured another glass. 

“BAC at 0.34%. Sir, if you keep drinking, you’ll pass out.”

“Good,” Tony nodded, lifting up the glass, toasting JARVIS. He drained the rest of the glass, swaying on the bar stool, finding it increasingly difficult to lift the bottle. “Odds?”

“70%.”

Tony grinned, grabbing the bottle.

Then he woke up on the floor.

He didn’t remember falling, but he noticed that his leg was tangled in the footrest of the bar stool, and it hurt, so he must’ve fallen sometime and not just decided to lie down on the ground like he did sometimes. Another thing he noticed was the splitting headache that pounded through his head, his brain, and made him feel like he was dying of some sort of migraine.

The third thing he noticed was that he basically lying in a puddle of his own vomit. The stench overwhelmed him, and he wondered why he hadn’t choked on it, when he realized that his head was sideways. He also wondered why he wasn’t on his back, then he remembered that his foot was caught, and that must’ve twisted him around with the resistance because his leg wouldn’t be bending the proper way had he been lying on his back.

Tony picked himself up, slowly. He’d order the cleaner bots to clean up his mess, maybe put a few air fresheners in the area. All he had to worry about was taking a shower and collapsing under his covers, sleeping the hangover away.

He bottled up the rest of the scotch and hid it behind the other bottles, silently cursing himself for not managing to fall facing the ceiling.

\--

“Tony Stark, you’re suicidal.”

Tony stared at himself in the mirror, his gaze going over his face, from his messy hair to his stubbled chin. “You. Are a mess.”

He pointed at his heart through the mirror, his finger resting on the reflective glass. “That right there? Non-existent.” He brought his finger up to point at his head. “That up there? Messed up.”

He pulled his finger away, noticing the fingerprint left on the mirror. Whatever. He’d get someone to clean it later. 

Tony sighed, bringing his hands down to grip on either side of the sink. He was finding it increasingly hard to sleep, increasingly hard to do things. He would go upstairs to go get food, then realize that he wasn’t actually hungry, then he’d go back to work. But then he’d realize that he couldn’t work, he couldn’t concentrate, because his mind was going too fast for his hands. His mind wouldn’t shut up about random thoughts, intrusive thoughts, even. 

Tony Stark finally admitted to himself that he needed help.

But who could he admit it to? Pepper was always worrying about him anyway, she didn’t need to make sure he wouldn’t kill himself every night she went away for a business trip. Rhodey wasn’t here, he was away with the air force, doing whatever the hell military people did, and actually had to do work for a living, so he couldn’t just drop everything and come rushing to him. The team would probably bench him until he got a hold of his mind again, but who knows how long that would be for? And he’d have to tell Rhodey and Pepper and maybe even the public why he wasn’t seen defending his planet, which would make everyone aware anyway.

So, no. Tony Stark was left admitting it to himself, alone in his bathroom. It would always be that way. Alone.

Today was a day in which he was feeling particularly sorry for his tragic life, so he cleared his schedule (he’d hear it later from Pepper, but he could make the argument that it was a Sunday and he wanted to rest) and decided to go visit his parents’ graves. With a bottle of whiskey. 

He cleaned himself up, putting on a proper suit as if he was going to a meeting and not a graveyard, and stopped by the bar. He grabbed a Royal Canadian Whisky, a bottle that was already half-finished, wrapped it in paper towel, and placed it gently in his briefcase. If anybody asked, he had a meeting to get to, and couldn’t stop to chat.

He decided to take a low-profile car, because he really didn’t want paparazzi following him to a graveyard of all places, and drove away. It was after church on a Sunday, so there wasn’t much traffic anyway. He got to the church beside where they were buried and entered, staring at the rows of pews and the bright display of stained-glass panels at the far end. Nobody was here, church service and Sunday school had long ended. He had the place to himself.

He sat down in a pew near the front, clasped his hands in front of him, and leaned forward, muttering things.

Tony Stark was not a religious man. Sure, he had been baptized, and his mother and father both believed in God, but he didn’t find himself too invested in the religion. His father said that God gave them the materials to build the magnificent things, so even though Howard was a man of science, God was behind him the whole way. His mother was religious, but didn’t share her views as much as his father did, but they were probably the same as Howard’s. 

Tony believed in Darwin’s theory of evolution, and thought for certain that there was no higher power, but who knew? Really, the things he’d seen over the past couple years, with SHIELD, the aliens, Loki and Thor, he really didn’t know what to think. But either way, Tony wouldn’t be caught dead in a church, praying to the Lord. Not that he found it silly, but he hadn’t even been in a church since his parents’ death. Obie had gotten cremated and there was no funeral, and even if there had been one, Tony wouldn’t have attended.

The Stark’s funeral hadn’t been in a funeral home; the ceremony was held in this very room, under the eyes of God. Had God not seen what Howard had done to Tony? What the media had done to Tony? There were cameras flashing even during Tony’s eulogy, and why the media was invited Tony had no idea. As soon as he stepped down from the podium, he went into a back room with a concerned Rhodey to try and calm himself down (he held himself together while the cameras were there and didn’t break until he was alone), and didn’t resurface until it was all over. 

He did not have a good relationship with churches. They were full of bad memories and itchy collars and snug shoes. 

Tony finished his little speech (Would it be considered a prayer? He just voiced his concerns about his health to God, seeing as he had no one else to talk to) and went out into the graveyard. There were always fresh flowers on his mother’s grave, as he had paid the caretaker to do that, but he didn’t feel the need to do the same for Howard. He didn’t deserve flowers.

He sat in between the two headstones, and cracked open his briefcase to retrieve the bottle. The alcohol stung his throat, but it was welcomed with open arms. 

“Here,” he said, after he’d finished his part of the bottle, already feeling the effects. He poured a small bit into the glass he kept beside Howard’s headstone, then clinked the mouth of the bottle and the glass together in a toast. “To the alcoholic in both of us.”

Tony, again, took a few small sips, straight from the bottle. He then placed it down beside him, and stared at his mother’s grave, arranging the flowers so they looked a bit more pleasing to the eye than whatever the caretaker had done. It looked like they were just hastily thrown on, not caring that they looked pretty so long as the person got paid to keep doing it.

“You deserved better,” he said simply, staring longingly at the name on the headstone. 

He packed the bottle up in his briefcase, stood up, and stared at the space between the graves. “Where do you think I’ll be buried?” he asked the two, as if they could answer. “In between you two? Maybe there won’t even be a body to bury,” he contemplated coldly, shaking his head. 

He kicked the glass over so that the whiskey poured into the ground in front of Howard’s headstone. 

“There’s no way I’d even pretend, even when I’m dead, that we’re a family,” he said, watching the alcohol seep into the ground. “I’d rather be cremated.”

He turned his back on the graveyard and headed out, found his car and sat down in the driver’s seat. His BAC was way too high, and as much as he loved the idea of driving off of a cliff, he didn’t want to put other people in danger. He dialed Happy; he would return for the car later.

“Hogan? I need a ride,” Tony said before Happy could say anything.

“Where are you?” Happy asked, and Tony could already hear the car starting.

“The graveyard,” Tony replied, knowing that he would know where to go without the specific address. It was the only graveyard Tony would visit, as he never did find out where Jarvis was buried. Not that he couldn’t just find out on his own, but in all honesty, he didn’t want to find out. 

“I’ll be there in ten,” Happy said, and Tony hung up. 

He sat in his car, the music off, wondering what it would be like to see Howard again in hell. Would he talk to him? Would he be cold towards him, the way he had been Tony’s entire life? Was there even a hell and a heaven?

God, just being around a church made him question his own existence. He turned on the radio, turning to some classical music station, and waited it out.

Happy arrived almost exactly ten minutes later (ten minutes and seventeen seconds), and Tony climbed out of his car, and wordlessly slid into the backseat of Happy’s. He knew he reeked of alcohol, and he knew that Happy knew he wasn’t doing too great. But Hogan was paid not to judge, just drive, so he didn’t ask much.

“You alright, boss?”

“Just take me to the tower.”

\--

“What the hell was that, Stark?” 

Tony sat in the helicarrier with the rest of the team, after raiding an abandoned Hydra base; they were making their rounds with all of them, usually finding unimportant information, but this one had traps and the like. And Tony marched right in, detonated a land mine, and nearly blew himself up.

“Are you trying to kill yourself?” Steve yelled again, standing up and putting his hands on the conference table. “We have tools! Devices that can detect bombs, mines, traps! And you decide to walk in like you own the place?”

Tony didn’t say anything, just looked at Cap dead in the eye, squaring his jaw.

“I’m benching you. You could’ve hurt us. You could’ve gotten killed.”

“I knew that I could’ve died!” Tony said, finally speaking up. “I don’t need your incessant jabbering, telling me things I already know.”

“And yet you still go in, throwing yourself at danger?” Steve asked, his eyebrows low. 

“Don’t pretend you care,” Tony spat. 

“It’s for your own good.”

“No, it’s for the goodness of the team. I’m a liability! I get it!” Tony said, standing up and opening his arms. “I fund you, I house you, and yet I can’t even be on the team because of a few, calculated risks.”

“You could’ve died, Stark.”

“So be it!” Tony said, raising his chin. “If I die, I die. I don’t care!”

Steve paused, not sure how to respond. Tony shut his mouth, realizing that he was oversharing, and glanced around the room. Everyone’s face was blank, passive, as if they were all watching a stupid movie with terrible acting. Except for Bruce, who looked like he was on the verge of Hulking out.

“Forget it,” Tony said, and the face plate snapped down. “Fuck all of you.”

He stepped out into a separate room (at least he had the courtesy to not break the window in the conference room and send all of the air pressure elsewhere) and flew through the window. He needed to go home. To Pepper. To Rhodey. He was benched, so what the hell, he didn’t even need to stay in the tower anymore.

Touching down in front of his Malibu mansion, he asked JARVIS if anyone was home, and when the response was negative, he let a small, cold smile stretch his lips. He climbed down to his workshop and took off the suit, then grabbed a few spare parts at random and chucked them at the wall. He needed to destroy, he felt like swinging a sledgehammer at a wall, he just needed to, to work on something, to get his mind off of the conversation back in the stupid conference room. He poured a few drinks from the bar and pulled up some plans for something he’d been meaning to do forever.

“Mark the back wall, we need, like, a thing, to go through that, and-” Tony cut himself short, clutching his chest. “JARVIS?”

“Sir, your heart-”

“Heart attack? Fibrillating?” Tony asked, trying to make sense of the sudden pain in his chest. He pulled at the collar of his shirt, loosening it, but it still felt like he was suffocating. 

“My diagnosis is that you are experiencing an anxiety attack,” JARVIS informed him.

Tony paused, holding his breath, rubbing his collarbone. “So, so no defibrillator needed?” he said in a weak attempt to lighten the mood, but it was just him and JARVIS. He didn’t need to. So why did he always feel like he needed to save face? 

“Sir, I have a selection of breathing exercises from the Internet, if you would-”

“No, no, we’re uh, we’re doing just, just fine, here,” Tony said, closing his eyes and putting his head against the cool counter. “Not my, not my first time, after all.”

He was still so new to this whole ‘anxiety’ business, ever since that time with Rhodey. He still couldn’t recognize the symptoms, still didn’t know how to keep things under control. But he had lived through the prior attacks, so he could live through this one. Probably. Unless he passed out and stopped breathing, unless the arc reactor suddenly decided to stop working, unless his heart decided to conk out with over-exertion, unless, unlessunlessunless-

“Sir, I recommend-”

“JARVIS,” Tony said simply, and the AI shut up. 

Tony stood up shakily, still feeling the full effects of the attack, grabbed a small hammer and rammed it into the wall. He needed access to the wiring over there anyway, and it felt great to get the pent up adrenaline out and doing something. Like, destroying things. And building. And more destroying. He felt like the Hulk, and not in a great way.

“Sir, this is not the most efficient-”

“Try new things,” Tony said, his breath catching as he pulled on the wire and attached a crocodile clip onto it, planning to build on another charging port. He went back over to his things and pulled up a hologram of his newest suit, that didn’t yet have one, and he was planning to build more suits, anyway. He needed more room. He needed-

He finally had a use for all of the room that he carved out underneath his floor. Charging space. Storage space. He could use that, he could store his suits down there with their charging ports, and keep them on display, ready at hand. He could make protocols to activate them all at once. His own personal army.

His breathing slowed down as he worked on the schematics with the hologram of his mansion, already virtually building everything he needed. He felt his mind quiet down as he zeroed in on his work.

He could do this.

\--

The first thing Steve noticed when he walked into the mansion was the giant hole in the ground.

“Particle accelerator,” Pepper said distastefully. “He said he’d move it into the sub-basement when he’s done renovating it.”

Steve nodded. “Is he alright?”

“He won’t talk to me. Just been building suits and renovating. When he does look at me it’s as if he has no clue who I am,” Pepper shrugged. “He’s going to kill himself down there, he’s working himself to the core.”

Steve shook his head. He had come to tell Tony that if he was doing better, he could come back to being an Avenger. But it kind of looked like he was going to stay benched for a while, at least until whatever he’s doing down there is finished. There were metal scraps all over the main floor, shipments randomly on tables and couches so there was nowhere to sit or just be homely. It wasn’t a home, here; it was a warehouse.

“I’ll see if I can talk some sense into him,” Steve said, and Pepper pointed to the stairs that undoubtedly led to where Tony was working. 

He made his way downstairs, a careful step at a time, as there was clutter left on the ground. He looked around, frowning at another gaping hole in the ground, when Tony popped his head up from it and caught Steve’s eye, reminding him of a gopher.

“Ah, Cap. JARVIS told me you were here,” Tony said cheerfully, climbing out of the hole and wiping his dusty hands on his jeans. “What can I do for you?”

“I came to tell you that you’re free to come back, but-” Steve looked Tony up and down carefully. “Pepper seems to think otherwise.”

“Yeah, well, I’m working,” Tony shrugged. “Got things to do. Could be put on hold, if you need me back at the tower?” he said, but it was more of a question, accompanied with a raised eyebrow.

Steve sighed. In all honesty, the tower just felt empty. It wasn’t like Tony was a regular presence in the common area anyway, but when he was there, he made sure that everyone knew. And it didn’t help that they were all failing miserably with handling Tony’s tech, like the trackers that Tony implemented on some weapons that they sold on the black market to be able to track down Hydra members. He made it seem so easy, navigating the coded world to be able to find the coordinates, and no matter how many times JARVIS tried to help them out, they just weren’t working without their resident genius. Not even Bruce could figure it out, as he was more of a bio type of scientist. Also, the bots that Tony had made were getting annoyed, snipping at anyone who tried to get within ten feet of his workshop doors. 

“You’re welcome back, anytime,” Steve said finally, holding his hand out for a shake. Tony took it, firmly grasping Steve’s hand and squeezing it. 

“Pleasure,” Tony said, and he waved his hands, and the lights turned off. “JARVIS? Mansion project on hold.”

“Yes sir. Miss Potts has been notified of your decision. She says, ‘finally’.”

“If she keeps that up, I’ll start thinking that she doesn’t like me,” Tony said, joking, and he turned back to Steve.

“Ready?”

Tony clasped his hands together. “Back in business,” he said, grinning.

\--

A working Tony was a happy Tony, so he found out back at the mansion.

He didn’t have one intrusive thought while he was working. Which made him feel like, with the power of suppression and denial, he got better. He was no longer salty at Steve for benching him, and suddenly didn’t feel like jumping off of a roof whenever someone so much raised their voice. He was doing much better, and yeah, maybe Cap had a point; he needed a break from Avenging to sort himself out.

So then when he once again, walked into danger, he surprised even himself. And it wasn’t just the inevitable explosion that happened that surprised him; it was the fact that he thought he was getting better, and then his feet had taken him unwillingly into a very obvious tripwire. He wasn’t hurt, necessarily; only his pride. But it still shook him.

Steve pulled him from the wreckage and pointed back to the Quinjet. “Go,” he said sternly, through gritted teeth. Tony knew better than to argue and left.

Bruce was waiting in the jet for a code green, and if he was surprised that Tony had been benched once again, he didn’t show it. Tony just sat in the chair, his armour dematerializing, and waited. They didn’t say a word to each other.

The mission went smoothly; the ‘other guy’ wasn’t needed, and sure enough, neither was Tony. He had tried to mentally prepare himself for Cap’s speech, but as soon as he went up to him with stern eyebrows, the shield that Tony had put up fell down.

“I thought you got better,” Steve said curtly.

“So did I,” Tony replied honestly, without a bite. He looked down at his hands.

Steve put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed it. “We’ll talk later.”

Tony nodded, dreading the conversation. Steve would draw it out, try to get everything out of him before Tony even knew what was going on. Or worse, they’d have a fight, and Tony would get benched again, and get sent back to Pepper, who didn’t even want him. And how was he supposed to tell her? ‘Oh, sorry, I’m borderline suicidal so they kicked me off of the team’ was bound to raise some red flags with her, and he didn’t want her worrying. Nah, it was better to deflect every confrontation with a joke, or a snarky remark. He was better at sarcasm anyway.

Back at the tower, Steve called for a later debrief and instead brought Tony into the conference room early, and sat him down with a cup of coffee. 

“Explain yourself,” he said simply. 

Tony wrapped his hands around the mug. “Explain what?” he said, playing stupid.

“Why did you think it was a good idea to just walk in?” Steve asked, sighing. “We’ve gone over this. I thought you got better.”

“You know what, Cap?” Tony said, gritting his teeth. “I thought I did too. I told you that.”

“I think I want a better explanation than just that.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t even know what’s up with me.”

“I could get you evaluated again,” Steve offered, and he didn’t sound all that mean about it. Just trying to help.

“You call a psych eval, I’ll just lie. You bench me again, I go home, and I work some more. Either way is fine for me,” Tony said, his tone low. “You do what you want, and I’ll keep doing what I do.”

Tony got up and left the room, leaving Steve alone. Behind the glass walls of the conference room, Steve was rubbing at the bridge of his nose, wondering what the heck he'd done to deserve this type of stubbornness on his team.

He didn’t quite remember going there, but Tony ended up sitting on the edge of the roof, a hologram beaming from his phone. It was of the tower, and he was running a simulation. Different wind speeds, different angles, different clothes. He was satisfied that for every single simulation, every single variable, the odds of survival for falling from this height was 0%.

Then the door to the roof opened, and Bruce stepped out into the mid-afternoon sky. He sat down beside Tony, not saying a word, watching his eyes as he focused on the hologram of the tower.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Bruce finally asked, moving his eyes from Tony’s to the hologram.

“This,” Tony said, spinning the tower hologram. “This is right and wrong. There is no if.”

“What do you mean?”

“Here,” Tony plugged in a few variables, turned the tower around so that the little dot that symbolized a person was facing Bruce. The simulation started, and the dot fell, and a ‘0% chance of survival’ notice popped up.

“But you’re not going to do that, right Tony?” Bruce asked, horrified, grabbing onto Tony’s shirt. 

“Nope,” Tony says, shaking his head and prying Bruce’s fingers off of him. “It’s just comforting. A way out.”

Bruce didn’t know what to say to that.

“There’s no gray area of survival. There’s no if. It’s that I stay up here and survive, or I jump and I don’t,” he explained. “It’s black and white. I don’t like if’s.”

“Tony,” Bruce said finally. "I think you need help."

Tony just let out a cold laugh. “You know that giant bee? That was on purpose. Same with the lab explosion that you happened to ‘save’ me from,” he did air quotes. “The land mine as well.”

“Tony…”

“I’m not a good person,” he said sourly, closing the simulation. “I’m, I’m a mess.”

Bruce just sat there, not quite knowing how to comfort him. He’d never seen him like that, so admitting and open. Tony was always a closed-up guy. It was hard to read him through the media mask that he used even on his friends, and when he did admit to something, it was always jokingly and no one ever knew if he was serious or not.

“I need a drink,” Tony said finally, standing up, grabbing his phone and heading back to the door. The hinges creaked and the door slammed closed, leaving Bruce out on the roof, worried.

That wasn’t the Tony Stark that everybody knew. That was the real Tony Stark.

\--

The intervention wasn’t all that successful.

After Bruce told Steve what was up with Tony, Steve tried to go downstairs to talk heart-to-heart with him. But Tony waved him off, always telling jokes, and then the rest of the team came down because of the raised voices, and Tony just kept cracking jokes and not taking it seriously at all. He had the mask on, and there was nothing anybody could do to rip it off, especially with the whole team there; if it had just been Bruce, or Steve, or one person at a time, maybe then they would’ve gotten Tony to open up. But no, they had to do an all-hands-on-deck scenario and there was no way that he’d tell his thoughts to every single person on the team.

So Steve benched him. Tony was going back to the mansion, once again, back to Pepper and Rhodey, and his project. Back to not being able to sleep. Because after New York, nothing’s been the same.

He packed up his robots this time, bringing Dum-E and U and Butterfingers with him, but left everything else. The lab was locked; nobody was getting in unless they broke the glass, which was near-impossible. Tony even told JARVIS only to interact if they asked him to; one final ‘fuck you’ to the team, as they all loved the AI and how simple it made their lives.

Tony stopped by the roof, one last time, and calculated the fall. Still 0% chance of survival.

He nodded. “Then let's do it, alright?”

“Do what, sir?” his AI asked through his phone, concern lacing his voice. It was insane, how much code could do.

Tony smiled. He stood up, and grabbed his phone off of the ledge. “Let’s go home.”

Tony went down stairs, and pulled away from the tower in a less-than-ideal car (you try fitting three robots inside of your Lykan Hypersport), without a backwards glance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment it gives me the will to live back :)


End file.
